Tareq Ayyoub

By Joel Simon

In 2008, the numbers of journalists killed and jailed both dropped for the first time since the war on terror was launched in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks. This is welcome news, but it is tempered by harsh realities. The war on terror had a devastating effect on journalists, and the trends will be difficult to reverse. Over seven years, journalists were targeted for murder in record numbers, while deterioration in the international legal environment led to a surge in journalist imprisonments.

New York, April 7, 2008—Five years after a series of U.S. military strikes against media outlets in Baghdad killed three journalists, CPJ calls on the U.S. military to fully investigate the incidents and make its findings public. CPJ also calls on the U.S. military to implement procedures to address the presence of journalists on the battlefield.

On April 8, 2003, a U.S. tank fired a single shell on the Palestine Hotel, the main base for dozens of international journalists covering the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, killing Spanish cameraman José Couso of Telecinco and veteran Reuters cameraman Taras Protsyuk, and wounding three other reporters. A CPJ investigation into the attack, “Permission to Fire,” found that although the attack on the hotel was not deliberate, it could have been avoided and may have been caused by a breakdown in communication within the U.S. Army chain of command.

For the fourth consecutive year, Iraq was the most dangerous reporting assignment in the world, exacting a frightening toll on local and foreign journalists. Thirty-two journalists and 15 media support staffers were killed during the year, bringing to 129 the number of media personnel killed in action since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003. Those numbers easily made Iraq the deadliest conflict for the press in CPJ’s 25-year history. For the first time, murder overtook crossfire as the leading cause of journalist deaths in Iraq, with insurgent groups ruthlessly targeting journalists for political, sectarian, and Western affiliations.

New York, October 20, 2006—The Committee to Protect Journalists has appealed the Pentagon’s refusal to release information about the U.S. bombing of Al-Jazeera television’s Baghdad bureau in 2003 which killed a reporter.

The formal appeal sent on Thursday followed the revelation by Britain’s Channel 4 this week that former British Home Secretary (Interior Minister) David Blunkett had suggested around the time of the March 2003 invasion of Iraq by the United States and Britain that bombing Al-Jazeera’s Baghdad transmitters might be justified. This has added to suspicions that the station may have been deliberately targeted.

New York, June 21, 2006—The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply troubled by allegations contained in author Ron Suskind’s new book, The One Percent Doctrine, that U.S. forces deliberately targeted Al-Jazeera’s Kabul bureau in November 2001.

“On November 13, a hectic day when Kabul fell to the Northern Alliance and there were celebrations in the streets of the city, a U.S. missile obliterated Al-Jazeera’s office,” Suskind wrote in the book, which was released yesterday. “Inside the CIA and White House there was satisfaction that a message had been sent to Al-Jazeera.”

13 Confirmed cases of journalists killed in Iraq by U.S. Forces (March 2003-August 2005)

New York, November 23, 2005—U.S. President George Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair should clarify reports by a British newspaper that Bush had raised the idea of bombing the headquarters and other offices of the Qatar-based satellite television network Al-Jazeera during an April 2004 meeting with Blair in Washington.

The London-based tabloid the Daily Mirror reported that Bush raised the idea of bombing Al-Jazeera's offices but that Blair advised against it, saying such action would provoke a global backlash. The paper's sources disagreed on the nature of Bush's alleged suggestion. One government source dismissed the remark as "humorous, not serious," and an unidentified source claimed the president was "deadly serious." The Washington Post quoted a senior U.S. diplomat as saying the report "sounds like one of the president's one-liners that is meant as a joke."

Doha, Qatar, Monday, May 23, 2005—The Committee to Protect Journalists has analyzed the deaths of journalists across the world for many years, producing two recent reports that highlight alarming trends in the circumstances, locations, and motives.

At least 339 journalists were killed on duty between 1995 and 2004, according to CPJ research compiled in January. But the vast majority did not die on any battlefield, or while covering a dangerous assignment. They were murdered in cold blood, in reprisal for their work or to prevent them from doing their jobs.